With the next gen systems probably as soon as next year or as far away as a few years. I have to ask the question what is more important next generation. Power or Innovation?

This generation nobody expected to see Nintendo release Wii. They expected a powerful console to challenge Sony and Microsoft. Everybody assumed wrong, developers and Michael Pachter all said it would fail. But this generation innovation trumped raw power. The 360 the second weakest console managed to secure third place in the market while the power house PS3 lost out (Might change in the year or so left till next gen).

Innovation - Nintendo claims that their next generation console will make your jaw drop. Iwata and Miyamoto have both said the next console will offer experiances developers couldn't make for the current Wii. All this talk sounds as if Nintendo is going the route of innovation. However Microsoft launched Kinect and it is likely to come default with every Nex-Box, but will Microsoft innovate the Kinect to make it even more appealing. Would you want to see some new innovative control scheme from Sony over raw power.

Power - Up until Wii Nintendo had a reputation of always releasing systems with superior or almost par power. The SNES was as powerful as Genesis the N64 more powerful then any console on the market the GameCube more powerful then PS2 and DreamCast. Microsoft entered the market with the uber powerful X-Box. Sony began this generation by blowing the 360's graphical power out of the water. In an arms race all three companies have liked to use raw power in the past to secure market share.

A THQ rep just recently stated that a next generation game would carry a price tag of 100$ or more. He claimed that the technology would be extremely expensive to develop for. But who says that the hardware will be that much improvedgraphically and feature wise? Who said the big three won't innovate and create an inexpensive platform to develop for?

Do you think next generation Innovation will be able to trump raw power? or do you think that Innovation will decide who wins next generation? Or will a console next gen have to have both raw power and innovation? (Not in the poll).

Power! 

Now, I wouldn't say that, really...

On topic: neither. Smart pricing, marketing, and building on past success will bring victory. You can argue that the Wii won though innovation, but nobody would know of it if it wasn't so brilliantly advertised by Nintendo. They have given the masses appeal, and the masses took it. The masses win console wars, and not always through innovation - look how the PS1 and 2 trounced the competition - both weakest in their gens (bar Dreamcast), and didn't innovate for shit (heck, even the controller is an improved SNES pad).

Mass appeal wins. Look at how meteoric the Kinect is.

Huh, upon typing this whole thing, I'd say that it leans more toward innovation, but it's not ALWAYS key.

NGP seems to offer both hurray! Why compromise?

But Rol Sega always innovated (CD, VMU , Activator...etc...etc...) yet they always lost. Nintendo also innovated that could be the reason but as you said SNES was more powerful the Genesis and won despite Genesis bringing in CD's , motion controls and such. DreamCast and GameCube also innovated far more then PS2 did. The VMU and the WaveBird. Don't forget the N64 (3D and rumble).

Now I don't think power will be the deciding factor I voted Innovation. But in the past their are cases of power trumping innovation and innovation trumping power.

Those are not generation winners, none. Besides, the Master System had rudimentary 3D.

I hope innovation wins because I'm tired of seeing FPS clones dominate the market.  It has to end at some point.

Are people really getting hyped up for this?

Innovation will certainly matter the most,but power will also be needed to succed,just not as much as innovation.

EDIT: NVM,misread what you said..

Simply using a new tech is not innovation.

Innovation is making the product appealing (and actually work) to the masses.

Hardware is useless if there's no software to make effective use of it.